July 30, 1998 | Read Time: 2 minutes
A coalition of 200 non-profit groups has sued the Postal Service in an attempt to persuade the courts to cancel postage increases that are due to take effect on January 10.
The Alliance of Nonprofit Mailers filed a lawsuit in the U.S. Court of Appeals here, arguing that the Postal Service has acted illegally in raising rates.
Under the new rates, many charities — unlike commercial mailers — will see double-digit percentage increases over their current postage rates.
Non-profit periodicals will cost 8 per cent more to mail, on average, compared with a 4.6-per-cent increase for commercial periodicals.
Postage on non-profit letters and flats, classified as “standard” mail, will rise by about 14 per cent. That is far more than the average postage increase of 2.9 per cent that the Service is touting for all types of mail.
In the months leading up to the decision to raise postal rates, the alliance had joined other non-profit groups in arguing that the Postal Service had used outdated and inaccurate information to come up with the new non-profit rates.
But it is taking a different approach in its lawsuit. The alliance charges that the Postal Service has broken a federal law that says the agency must set its rates so that they are equal to, and don’t exceed, its costs.
Because the service has posted huge surpluses of more than $1-billion annually for the past three years, the alliance argues that the Postal Service doesn’t need to raise rates at all and that doing so will violate the break-even law.
Postal officials declined to comment on the lawsuit, or on any of the arguments made by the alliance, citing the agency’s customary policy of not commenting while lawsuits in which it is involved are pending.
The non-profit coalition is now trying to encourage other mailers to join in the lawsuit. Even if the alliance succeeds in broadening the opposition and in persuading the court to knock down the rates, it seems unlikely that any action could happen fast enough to stop the increase from taking effect. However, the courts can order the service to roll back the rates retroactively.
Meanwhile, an attempt by another group, the National Federation of Nonprofits, to persuade Congress to stop the increase have so far been unsuccessful. The federation, which represents 300 groups, has failed to enlist a member of Congress to sponsor a bill that would require the Postal Service to increase non-profit and commercial postage by similar percentages.
